SUNDAY, DECEMBER 13
The house smells of dead animal. Like hide and fat and wild game. The acrid scent will last for several days, but there’s no help for that. The deer tallow is pungent, but once it has been made into candles and cured, the stench will fade. I have added dried, crushed lavender and rosemary—along with their oils—to each of the four rendering pots that sit on my worktable. In a week, the candles will simply smell like the forest. And the house will smell of home once more.
“There,” Dolly says, tying the last of the linen threads to the end of a slender, foot-long branch. “Two hundred and forty.”
I inspect her work, then nod in approval. Dolly tied the wicks while I readied the hardening racks along the edge of the room. Each branch will hold two candles, and each rack will hold forty-eight. Altogether, we should have enough candles to get through the winter, with extra for bartering.
We spent all morning rendering the deer fat given to us by Amos Pollard, then straining it until the tallow was smooth and pale. Dolly and I both wear aprons to keep the oily splatters off our clothes, and scarves around our hair to keep it from falling in our eyes. Candle making is hard, sweaty work, and not a task meant to make a woman look pretty. It is, however, one of the necessary parts of running a household.
We take our spots at the table and lower the first branches so that the wicks on either end drop into separate pots. The thick linen strings soak up the wax for a moment before we lift them out again. It takes a few seconds for the rendered fat to harden and then we plunge them in again. We repeat the process, watching each candle grow in width with every immersion. Once they are an inch wide, we set the branches across a drying rack so that the candles dangle as they harden. The task will take several hours to complete, but neither of us minds. Rarely do we get an entire day together.
It is one of those winter afternoons that is so bright the sun reflects off the snow and hurts my eyes if I look at it directly. I cannot help but worry about Ephraim working his way through the frozen marsh up north. His people are Welsh but have lived in the colonies for two generations and have grown acclimated to these northeastern winters. He insists that he no longer feels the cold. I know that he’s lying, but he says it anyway. It’s the game we play—a dance of concern and denial.
Hannah has been with Lucy, our oldest, married daughter, and her family on the other side of the river, near Fort Western, all week. Lucy had her seventh child—Hannah’s namesake—earlier in the year and was eager for both her help and her company. There are eleven years between them, but they have always had a special bond. And now that Hannah is nearing the age of marriage herself, I suspect there are questions she would rather ask her sister. This reality makes me a bit uneasy, however, given Lucy’s casual attitude toward things of a carnal nature. Her first child was born a mere five months after her wedding.
There are rules and rituals, of course, for young people and how they court. Usually, it begins at one of the seasonal Frolics. Just last month, May Kimble’s family hosted one, and there will be another in January here at the mill. But still, young people always find ways to be together, away from watchful eyes, and anytime my children are out of sight, I wonder what they might be up to.
As for the boys, Young Ephraim has joined his older brothers in cutting trees in the forest today, and none of them will be home until dinner. Only Dolly and I are here, and it is both restful and strange. It seems as though
only yesterday I had a baby on each hip and two more wrapped around my ankles.
I plunge the candles into the tallow, then pull them out again, watching the excess drip off and back into the pot. The rendered fat has cooled slightly and isn’t as runny, making the process go faster, and I like the way the dried herbs speckle the tallow. But I keep an eye on the consistency because if it gets much thicker the pots will need to go back over the fire.
We work in companionable silence until Dolly says, “I took stew and bread to Mistress Foster yesterday while you were out.”
“And is she well?” I ask.
“No better,” Dolly says. “No worse.”
Ever since Sally Pierce made her accusations, the Fosters’ world has grown increasingly small. Many of those inclined to defend them now whisper behind their backs. They wonder. They gossip. Some neighbors avoid them altogether. Few in the Hook cared that Joshua Burgess was dead until their pastor was incriminated in his murder. And those who dismissed Rebecca’s claim of being raped look at her askance now that she is pregnant.
I am thinking about what I might do for Rebecca when Dolly points at something out the window.
“Who is that?” she asks. It’s a simple question, but there is a curiosity
—a certain kind of light in her eyes—that I note before turning to the window.
A man has driven his wagon up to the garden gate and dismounted. He is young and agile, of average height, and I recognize him immediately.
“That is Barnabas Lambard.” “I’ve never heard the name.”
“He’s an officer of the court from Vassalboro.”
Dolly finishes dipping her candles, sets the branch on the hardening rack, then moves to the window for a better look. She fists her hands on her hips and gives the man a curious stare, head cocked to the side, lips pursed. “Why would an officer of the court come here?”
“An excellent question,” I say. “You keep working on the candles. I’ll find out.”
“My tallow has gone thick,” she says, and I know she wants to come along. By the faint smile tugging at the edge of her mouth, I suspect that Dolly might find the young man attractive.
“Then melt it again. I’ll be back shortly.”
I keep my apron on and the scarf around my head when I go to greet Mr. Lambard. I pull the front door open before he has made it through the garden gate.
He tips his hat. “Good morning, Mistress…?” “Ballard.”
“Good morning, Mistress Ballard, I’m—” “I know who you are, Mr. Lambard.”
He stops on the path, chin tilted to the side, an expression on his face that suggests he’s trying to remember if we have met. “You do?”
“I saw you apprehend James Wall in the Hook yesterday.”
He takes off the wide-brimmed felt cap and whacks it against his leg twice even though it isn’t dusty. “Ah. Then you won’t be surprised to hear that I’ve come to arrest someone else.”
I like James and still think it unfair that a measly debt could land him in jail, so I can’t keep the snide tone out of my voice when I reply, “Someone forget to pay their taxes? Or perhaps you’re after a gossip?”
There, I’ve almost made him smile, but it doesn’t quite reach the surface.
“A bit more serious than that, I’m afraid. I’m here to arrest a man accused of rape.”
“You’ve come for Joseph North?”
He shakes his head, and a single curl flops onto his forehead and falls across his eye. It makes him look younger somehow, less serious. He shoves it away with the back of his hand. “No. I’m here for Joshua Burgess.”
He doesn’t know. How is that possible?
“Well, Joshua Burgess doesn’t live here,” I hedge.
“So I gathered. But now I’m known in town, after what happened yesterday. And it’s always best to have the element of surprise when coming to arrest a man. I halfway expect him to have fled anyway. I thought I’d stop and ask the neighbors first.”
“And you just happened upon us?”
“You are the first drive off the main road into town.” He hooks one thumb over his shoulder and points north. “At least coming from Vassalboro.”
“Well,” I say, taking comfort in the coincidence, “I know for a fact that Burgess hasn’t fled.”
“But are you willing to tell me where he is?”
I pull the corner of my bottom lip into my mouth, thinking. “If you’ll tell me something in exchange.”
“And what would that be?”
“Why you haven’t come for Joseph North?”
“Ah, I see.” Barnabas scratches the back of his neck. “Direct orders from the court. I’m to let North come in on his own for the hearing.”
“And why does he get different treatment?” “Because he’s a judge. And a colonel.”
“James Wall was a captain, and you arrested him in front of twenty people.”
He nods once but doesn’t break eye contact. “There’s a wide gap between captain and colonel, isn’t there?”
“And a wide gap in favor too, I’d say. You think that is fair?”
“What I think has nothing to do with it. I’m only an officer of the court; no one asks my opinion.”
“I just did.”
He flashes a quick, bright smile. “I think that I’ve a single job, Mistress, to apprehend the men I’m ordered to. And I’m the sort of man who does my job.”
Yesterday, when he was scuffling with James, I hadn’t gotten a good look at him. But I take Barnabas in now, curious about this man who has stepped into the scandal enfolding our town. He has sandy-colored hair and
eyes that might be hazel. Or perhaps brown. I can’t tell from this distance. But there’s something about his face and the way he moves that makes him appear unremarkable. It occurs to me that perhaps he does this on purpose, to seem nonthreatening. He’s young to be an officer of the court, and looking nondescript—especially to strangers—would be an advantage.
“Your turn,” he says. “I’ve answered your questions.” “You can find Joshua Burgess at Pollard’s Tavern.”
He flicks a glance to the house behind me, then back, another smile quirking the corner of his mouth. “Seems to be a popular place amongst the criminal element in your town.”
“James isn’t a criminal,” I say. “He’s a friend, in fact. And there isn’t a man in this town who wasn’t shocked to hear that he’s failed to pay a debt.”
Abashed, Barnabas nods once. It’s not an apology—he doesn’t owe me one—but rather an acknowledgment that he’s misjudged the man.
“Go to the tavern. Ask for Amos Pollard. Tell him I sent you. He’ll take you to Burgess.”
“I thank you for the help,” he says, replacing his hat. He tips it, adds, “Mistress,” then looks over my shoulder. Again, he offers that charming smile and tips his hat a second time. “Miss.”
I turn to find Dolly leaning in the doorway, hand on her hip, scarf conspicuously missing from her hair. She watches Barnabas with an expression that I can only describe as proprietary.
Well, that’s new.
“Good day to you, Mr. Lambard,” I say, walking to the garden gate to see him off. He unties the reins and climbs onto the wagon seat.
Another tip of his hat. Another glance over my shoulder. A smile that twitches at the corner of his mouth. And then he is gone, unaware of the gruesome discovery awaiting him at the tavern.
Dolly comes down the walkway to my side. “Why didn’t you tell him?”
“About Burgess?” “Yes.”
“Because he’d have gone back to Vassalboro.”
“That’s a bad thing?”
“If he goes home now, he’ll never see the body. And if he never sees that body, he won’t ask any questions about how Joshua Burgess came to be hanged, then thrown in the river.” I look Dolly full in the face and see the vivid flash of understanding in her eyes. “I want as many people asking questions as possible.”
“I think he will,” Dolly says with a firm nod. She turns her gaze down the drive to where Barnabas and his wagon have already disappeared into the trees. “He seems clever.”
It’s a woman that does the choosing. I remember Ephraim’s statement from a few days ago. Anyone who thinks differently is a fool.
Tuesday, December 15—Clear and cold. I have been at home. Made twenty dozen candles. An officer went by here looking for Captain Burgess with a warrant for his arrest.
